I previously used Crunchbang (a minimalistic debian-based distro) and I had the problem with my sound randomly cutting out from my speakers in the middle of a song/video. It didn't matter whether or not it was on youtube, Rhythmbox, vlc, etc. Doing a force reload on alsa would fix it for another 3 or so minutes but then it would cut out again. I decided to switch to Cinnamon Mint 14 64 bit and my sound worked right after installation. Yet again, my sound cut off. I turned off "auto-mute" and the problem was fixed temporarily. Now my sound plays through my speakers at the login screen but it won't play at all once I'm logged in. My headphones still work, however. I tried uninstalling and re-installing the alsa related stuff and it didn't work. I'm now out of ideas, any suggestions?

IN my case, in the begging of my life with MInt have some problems with soud, I did't have sound on my tv for example.The I found Menu>SystemSettings>SoundIt allows to set up output devices which in my case solved any problems so far.The screen should look like this (of course I am using strange language ):

right, but the tab before is for output. There is one ("Sprzet") ie Hardware or equipment (sory got Polish on mine and can't translate it back 100% sure). If you change device there, then you get different inputs and outputs on the other tab. Thats bit strage, couse I got to change devices when I switch from Skype on headset to music speakers....

The only device I have is "built in audio". I'm just so confused as the login screen sounds work but then it doesn't work when I'm logged in. This never was an issue before. I've always had sound on this laptop on linux without having to fiddle around with anything.

I really know nothing about this because I haven't run across a problem. However I am running KDE and in system settings, phonon, audio hardware setup there is a selection for connector, either analog output or headphones. If I select headphones my speakers do nothing. Does Cinnamon have a 'connector' option?